Ptarmigan Lake is a popular hike nestled in the tall peaks of Colorado’s Sawatch Range. We made the fairly easy hike in the hopes of catching some of the lake’s healthy-sized Colorado River Cutthroat trout.
We love exploring the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, but in the last few years we’ve have mostly stuck to the Front Range in and near Rocky Mountain National Park, and also the Tenmile Range near Breckenridge. This year we decided to check out the Sawatch Range near Leadville, home to some of the tallest peaks in Colorado and the country (Mt. Elbert is second only to Mt. Whitney). Among these peaks are alpine lakes filled with Colorado River Cutthroats. One of those lakes is Ptarmigan Lake, which research told us held healthy-sized trout for a relatively moderate hike.
This popular hike is 6 miles round trip with about 1500 feet of elevation gain, a nice gradual ascent. The first part of the trail is through a mature pine and fir forest with limited views. At about 2 miles in the trees start to give way to the lush alpine meadows.
Even though it was late summer over Labor Day weekend, there were still quite a few stands of wildflowers along the trail.
At 2.4 miles, the trail goes by the first lake which has some small fish and nice views across towards Gladstone Ridge, a steep granite ridge.
The trail heads further up the valley leaving the trees completely behind at 11,800 ft elevation.
There is one last hill to climb to get to Ptarmigan Lake, and as we huffed and puffed our way up it, the views looking back down the valley towards 14,199 ft Mt. Yale were the best of the hike.
When we finally crested the hill, Ptarmigan lake opened up in front of us. While we didn’t feel like there were tons of people along the trail, there were already quite a few large groups of people at the lake, and many came and went throughout the day. Some people had even brought kayaks up!
We settled down on a grassy bank on the east side of the lake, and immediately noticed fish cruising – and they were pretty big (some pushing 18″)!
We got some action on a midge setup right away; Cory landed one of the smaller fish we could see swimming along the shoreline. Alas, despite the hoards of fish swimming around, it was some of the only action of the day. What a tease.
We continued to fish, but the fish were being extremely finicky. They were cruising seemingly not interested in eating our flies at all. We tried all kinds of flies, but to no avail. This was the second time we’ve come across this odd behavior, the other time was in Utah on Boulder Mountain. Perhaps they were cruising the shore feeding on something specific, but it definitely wasn’t what we were throwing. If anyone has any insight, feel free to share!
The lake is a fairly popular destination for the area, and it being the end of summer, the fish could also just be worn out from being fished to. It would be interesting to see how the fish act at this lake just after it ices out.
Despite the little action, it was promising to see such large, healthy fish in the lake, but frustrating to not be able to outsmart them!
Also, we’re not sure if actual ptarmigans are supposed to be present at their namesake lake, but there were no such birds to be found!
